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Topic: Retarded Dough (Read 2982 times)

Why is it that dough that has been refridgerated for 24-48 hours a lotharder to shape than a dough that had a short rise. Granted the refridgerateddoes give a better crust but it's to hard to work with.

Why is it that dough that has been refridgerated for 24-48 hours a lotharder to shape than a dough that had a short rise. Granted the refridgerateddoes give a better crust but it's to hard to work with.

Hi, rscox62 There can be a few resons why you are having difficulty shaping yhe retarded dough. The first is the dough coming out of the fridge must sit at roomtemperature for at leat 2 hours before shaping. I shape after almost 3 hours. the second is that you may have to increase the mix/kneading times, it is possible that you have not developed enough gluten structure in the dough. The third is that you may need to increase liqud/water levels, a dough with considerably less water% to flour will be more difficult to shape. If you are not using bakers percentages in your recipes. Try increasing the amount of water by lets say 1.oz per pound of flour used. 1 pound of bread flour being about 3 level cups. Just be careful not too add too much water. These are just some ideas,if you would like to post the exact recipe you are using myself or another member can further assist you. Thanks, Chiguy

It wasn't clear to me in reading your post whether the problem you have been having is that the dough stretches too much after 24-48 hours or it is too elastic and the dough springs back when you try to stretch it out. What chiguy has commented on is the case where your dough is too elastic. But your comments could apply to the case where the dough is too stretchy. It might also help to know what kind of pizza you are trying to make.

Well, Actually I have been experimenting and been making 2 pizza's a week for the last year using AP and Bread flour's.The pizza's weren't bad. I thought that my pizza curiosity was over until I stumbled on this post. Now I am even more curios that ever as I started to read all the posts. The pizza I made was the "tom lehmann's" recipe. I used KASL high gluten dough and refriderated it for 24 hours. I then let the dough come to room temperate for about 21/2 hours. The dough would just snap back if I tried to stretch it out. I never had that problem when the dough only had a 2 hour room temperature rise. I love the refridgerate dough because its got that leathery chewy crunch. It's just had to shape.

Since you posted under the NY Style topic, I wondered whether it was a Lehmann dough recipe that you tried. What prompted my question about the dough handling in my earlier post was the fact that the most common comment or complaint I get about the Lehmann dough is that it is "too" extensible (stretchy), not that it is too elastic. I would be very much interested to know which of the many Lehmann dough recipes on the site you used. There are many possible explanations for why your dough turned out too elastic. Chiguy touched on several of the possible reasons, but there are more. But to be more helpful to you, it would help me to know exactly how you made your dough and later managed it.

As you reply, it would be useful to know whether you weighed out the flour and water, or whether you used volume measurements. I try to provide accurate volume measurement for all of the Lehmann dough recipes I post. However, I use a precise approach for converting weights to volumes. I use a tablespoon to scoop flour weighed on my digital scale into measuring cups and spoons and level off the tops. If you in fact used volumes but didn't use my approach, you can easily have your flour/water ratio (hydration) thrown off, as chiguy suggested. If you ended up with too much flour and not enough water, you can easily end up with an overly elastic dough.

The other thing I'd like to know is if you reballed the dough when you took it out of the refrigerator. I don't mean flattening it on the work surface. I mean taking the dough ball and re-kneading it and reshaping it into a round ball. That will mess up the gluten structure big time and make the dough difficult to shape and stretch. It's not fatal but it will mean having to let the dough sit for another hour or two to allow the gluten to relax again to restore the manageability of the dough.

I highlighted the above possibilities because I think I can rule out many of the other possibilities for the over-elastic dough you made. But I won't know for sure until you tell me more about how you made and used your dough.

At least you were honest and didn't make me jump through 5 more hoops .

BTW, you will notice a more elastic tendency to the doughs made with high-gluten flour over the all-purpose and bread flours you have been using. Oftentimes, pizza operators will experience a "buckiness" to their high-gluten doughs. Rather than better managing the dough process, they will use a dough conditioner called PZ-44 to make the dough less elastic. As home pizza makers we would have to buy the stuff by the bagful (I would guess a 50-lb. bag).